What a great thread showing us the progression of your project, im assuming that, once your framing is in place you will then glass over the seam at the bottom and glass over the top for a finished look? Will you finish off the inside with upholstry or smooth finish.

Chart if you need a hand just give me shout, i keep my boat at the lake, sometime over at raymonds this year its on the hoist.

Later
Dave

Flew back to my office in Indy this afternoon. Jon and I cut out the windshield parts and mitered them to fit the wings. We thought about taking pictures of that, but it looks like the mock up, so no reason to use server space for that. Before bonding them to the deck, Jon wants to brace the deck from inside the cabin, so as to NOT bond a structural faring to a flexed deck. (His old windshield actually added a lot of support to the deck, and without it, the deck flexes more than he likes. Especially when a couple of people are on the deck trying to bond the faring to the deck).

With the little time left before going to the airport, we mocked up a wind deflecting lip out of the same material as the faring. We've given lots of thought to plexiglass like material to bolt on the top of the faring to keep wind out of our faces, but this may work as well. This will also give a larger flat area on top of the faring. The way this is built, stepping, standing, dancing, jumping etc on the top of the windshild part of the faring will cause NO damage. . . . we hope.

What do you think of the lip in the picture? Is it too big, too low, just right, what? We've got our views, but would like to know yours' too.

Hi Payton,

It's called Nida-Core and is made in Florida. We bought ours from Composits One in RI, but looking on their web site, they have a dist. center near you in Goshin IN. It comes in several finishes on the outside, and we used the chopper gun fiberglass finish. It could be ready to paint or gel coat with minimal prep. As far as Ship Shape, I don't know. Because I'm a boater, I'm too poor to afford cable TV.

Chart

The nida core is very strong, and we think yahoos can try to hold the boat off the dock with it and there will be no damage. It can be punctured easily, because it is only a 1/16 mil of fiberglass, but it does great taking preasure over a minimume area of an inch or two. And that is a lot more likely to happen than someone trying to poke a phillips screwdriver through it.

Personally, I like the thicker look of a faring over the thin look of al or glass. On my boat, I'm hopeing to double the wing thickness to match the gunnel thickness, but will have to see first. I lost count of how many ideas we had that would not work or had to be changed due to the angles of the boat. It will be thursday evening before I get back home to try the templets on my boat.

Olysan: Yes, I moved to St. Louis about a year ago. Still have an office in Indy. We live in Chesterfield, and would enjoy working with you on this. PM your contact info, and we'll get together.

Chart

AWSOME

Yes Jon did remove gel coat. Look in the last picture I posted, and see the El Camino in the foreground? It was royal blue on Friday.:D Personally, I don't know if I have it in me to take a 36 grit grinder to my boat:( It was one of the saddest moments we had doing this project. Kind of like cutting into a patient to do surgery. In fact, I'm considering glueing my faring to the gunnell instead of glassing it. Will have a better idea after I get home to it.

Chart

Chart maybe you are working on it now but can you please post up the pictures of the side view with the lip up high and then a little lower. Thanks

Jon

Later: Yes that's exactly what Jon will do. He would like to add padded upholstry to the top after the glass is done. And there will be some work on the inside of his boat, with the wings filled in and smoothed to the cockpit "wall". Because of the angle of the wing, and the tapering of the gunnell as it moves toward the deck, it will be a challenge to fill it in and make it look good, but Jon will do it. He also plans to add bulkheads under the trailing edge of the windshild part going virtically down to the dash, where gauges can be added on both sides of the boat. As my dash is different than his, the jury is still out on how to do this on mine.

You bet I'll give you a shout! One of the most productive parts of the past few days was the brainstorming on design. I'd welcome your help with that to start.

Chart

Jon, for you, ANYTHING!!

This picture is of the lip higher than the wing, as a pelxi lip might look. What do you all think of it high, vs. the next picture with it lower, even with the wing?

And this is the faring lower, even with the top of the wing.

Giving Credit to Mrs. Chart

She went Above and Beyond while I was in MA with AudioFn.

Before going, I took dozens of pictures of the front of my windshield and the deck, knowing that our decks were different, and wanting to be able to compare them during the building stage. While in MA, we discovered the area under the wings were also different, but I had no pictures of that.

Mrs. Chart went out in a 15 degree snow storm, climbed up a ladder, pulled back the cover, and took measurments. Then she took two rolls of film with the 35mm camera (as the digital was in MA), had them one-hour developed onto disc and emailed them to us.

A lot of guys' wives don't support their boating habit. Mrs. Chart not only supports it, but she is willing to suffer for it.

Jean, thank you.

Chart

Audio looks great! Keep the photos coming. Dont you just love those projects! Greg

The lip looks great. I would give the nod to the lower version, but it's almost a toss up. Low or high the lip has to be there, really sets off the design.

LOOKS GREAT and that material seems to be the right choice
Im with you on the DECK FLEX issue, I hope u have that covered

I have a built in fairing and I pulled the carpet of to see how they braced it , I found strips of glassed marine plywood, seems to be quite rigid, you might want to do something on that level

Chart I have an '82' 302 as well and I think the fairing looks great. Just my .02$ but I like the wind deflector up high as opposed to level with the top of the fairing. Rick G.

Simply my .02, but I like the look w/ the lip level w/ the top of the fairing. Great project to follow!!!



Aqua
:frog:

i like it up high gives it that Fountain look :D :D :D
Later
Dave

Hi Jon just following up my prevoius post about your old wind sheild. I'm still interested in it if you want to let it go . Thanks Rick G.

Rick you can have the thing. Just pay for the shipping and the boxing material and it is yours. If you want just the channeling so that you can lower yours then I can cut that up and send just that, so that the shipping will be a LOT cheaper. I am committed to this design now so I have absolutely no used for it, and it is in my office now!!!! I would MUCH rather see it go to a good home. :D:D

Jon

Hi Jon , thankyou very much I have a family member in the shipping business if you email an address where you are I can make arrangements to have it picked up. I would prefer you ship the whole thing all I ask is that you package so as to reduce the risk of damage and would be more than happy to re-imburse you for any and all out of pocket costs. Again email with some particulars so I can make arrangements for this or email your phone number and I will call you , I would enjoy talking to you in any event. I can fill you in on my various projects and endevors. Thanks again Rick G.

Well, it finally got warn enough to uncover the boat and try the templates. I don't think we have the same windshields. At the vary least, the angles are different. The wings are probably the same, but not the windshield portion.

Audio, before you pack and ship your windshield, please take some measurements. One side of my windshild is 42" long at the bottem, and 41" across the top. Diagonal meaurments are 46" and 50".

Overall, the '85 windshield is not so pointed, or it is straighter accross the beam of the boat. Still angled, but less than your '79.

See now what the heck did ya have to go and get a different boat then me for!!!! :D:D I will try and get you those measurements tomarrow.

Jon

Warm Enough?
 

I'm pretty sure it wasn't actually warm enough to work on the boat:D

Yes, there is a difference b/t warn enought to uncover the boat, and warm enough to work on it. The ladder was still standing on ice.

Chart If you need any help let me know. Forrest

Forrest: thanks for the offer. It will be a little while, and a little warmer, before much work is done on it.

You guys need to test some different heights. I think it should only be high enough to direct the wind over your head when sitting and low enough to have the wind coming off the fairing, hit you around the chest when standing. What you don't want is the wind deflecting straight into your face while standing.

The lower it is, the sportier it looks.

G

Hi I know everyone is sold on the honeycome just thought I would ad to that. That the same stuff that Boeing uses for its floor panels that you walk on in the air planes. Real strong tuff stuff, but a philips screew driver or sisors is hell on it. Charlie

Hi Jon , Rick here. Just wondering how the project is going . I'm sure everyone like me is dieing to see more pictures of your progress. Regards Rick G.

My wife and I also have a 302, she likes the windshield.. I like the windscreen. You guys are doing a great job, keep it up!

Jon,Chart, you guys are doing a great job. I helped a friend work on his old IMP it was great fun. Best of luck ,we need more pics:D :D

Talked with Jon yesterday, and he has not progressed on his faring since the last pictures were posted. Something about being a good little business man and not working on his boat when he is susposed to be working for his customers.

I don't have a nice shop like Jon, so my progess depends on nice days, and being in town to actually do the work. Sunday, I removed the windshield from my boat, and took some detailed measurements of the deck around the windshield. Then spent too much time trying to find material that could be bent into complex curves to act as a template. Don't want to fight with the masonite templates until I'm pretty sure of the curves. More details on the curved faring for the 1985 302 will be posted in the other tread.

Just tried to post a picture of removing the windshield, and to get it under 75K, it is too grainy. Sorry.

Chart if you want to send the pictures over to me and I will resize them for you.

Jon

WE Want PIctures . Keep them coming Jon. Regards RickG.

I will be working on it today :D

I will grab the camera on the way out the door :D

Jon

Ok guys sorry it has been a while since the last update. Business has been taking front row and I have been a good little boy and not worked on the boat when I am sapposed to be doing work work :(:( I did make a promise to the war dept. :D:D To add insult to injury the upload cable to the camera got lost. Oh well finally I have the pictures from last weekend. Last weekend I bonded the front fairing to the hull. This was a little difficult as I had to figure out how to hold it all dogether for the drying period of the resin. There were so many angles in there that I could not find a easy way to hold it in place. There was a lot of grinding that had to be done to the deck so that I could get through all the gell coat but I did eventually make it there. One thing that you can not see is under the deck I made a bracing system (just some 2X4's from the floor up) to hold the deck ROCK solid in that area. If it moved while I was placing the front pieces it would have ruined what I was doing. This first picture shows the port side corner of the fairing. If you look on the inside of the fairing you can see were I did all the grinding. On these old boats the idea with gell coat was if a little was good a lot must be better!!!! It is about 1/16th to a 1/8" thick in some places!!!! This thick gell coat is one of the reasons that these things always have cracks in the gell. Thinner is actually better as it will flex a little.

This is he starboard side. You can see that I used quick clamps to hold the window in place on the outside edges. In the middle I just used tape. Again the bonding was done with a mix of resin and micro balloons to make a nice thick paste. Kind of like the mortar for tiles in your bathroom. You can also see from this picture that a job like this is not for the week of heart. It is a dusty mess and believe me there is a LOT of clean up that is required when you are done. You can see on the dash the LAYER of dust that is grinding through the gell coat.

Once I got the front all done and it was all dry so it would not move I started to make the inside pieces. This will make the top of the fairing wider so it will be a more comfortable place to rest your arm. It will also make the fairing look more fitted on the boat. The problem........ is that the inside edge is not straite and the outside piece is angled in slightly. That means that I have to be able to bend a compound curve into the NIDA core!!! OUCH!!!! I think I am close to figureing this one out.

Hopefully this picture shows the bend that I have to do. You can see if you fallow the top edge that it gets narrower and on the bottom inside I had to make shims to keep it out were I wanted it.

Coming along nicely!